Products > 3D printing

Does a filament sensor degrade/fail over time

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manuel42:
I've bought a cheap filamentsensor from aliexpress.
It seems to be a spring which creates contact if the filament is in, and no contact if the filament runs out.



Does the spring work when the filament is always in there, or do those sensors fail over time?

beanflying:
Hi Manuel welcome to the forum. We do have an area for 3D printing if you want to take a look and a bit of a mini monster rambling thread on 3D printing in this section https://www.eevblog.com/forum/3d-printing/

On the filament sensor I had one fail on my CR-10S but I suspect in this case it was caused by me pulling filament out from the extruder through it (so backwards) and it damaged the blade and the switch failed. So I designed and built a new 3D printed housing to take another one I had on hand and included a Teflon guide for the filament while I was at it so I hope the lever is better protected.

As to failing over time there is very low voltage and current so it would be very unlikely for the contacts to fail, failure would likely be more like mine a mechanical issue.

manuel42:
Hi and thanks for the welcome.
I wasn't sure about which forum, but i'll use the 3d one the next time.

For the sensor, i guess i'll just use it and would report back if there are any issues.

cheers

Ian.M:
It appears to be based on a sub-miniature microswitch with a short lever arm operating its actuator.  As the actuator is protected from the friction and wear of the passing filament, and the switch wont be directly breaking significant current or voltage, the microswitch's service life is likely to be good.

However if mounted close to the extruder, as sub-miniature microswitches are rarely hermetically sealed, you may get a buidup of out-gassed plasticizer from the melted filament on its contacts, so if the controller doesn't provide sufficient wetting current for the switch, its likely to develop problems if the printer is either used very infrequently or is heavily used.   Reliability will also be impacted if the switch wiring is repeatedly flexed.

As the original poster (O.P.) in a topic, you have the ability to move it to another subforum, e.g  3D printing, as Beanflying suggested. See https://www.eevblog.com/forum/blog/what_s-this-move-topic-icon-all-about/

manuel42:
I've moved the thread to 3D printing.

I'm actually going to mount the sensor a bit away from the printer.
Filament is on a shelf on the wall and the sensor is just in front of the filament. Then there is about one meter to the printer.
The idea is to send me a push notification to the phone and to have enough time to pause the print for filament changing.

edit: This sensor is not integrated in the 3d board, but rather connected to a standalone arduino.

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